Turkey for the soul

STOCKTON - The Rev. Frank Saldana pokes at the red-hot coals with an everyday garden hoe.

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By Kevin Parrish

recordnet.com

By Kevin Parrish

Posted Nov. 16, 2012 at 12:01 AM

By Kevin Parrish

Posted Nov. 16, 2012 at 12:01 AM

Christmas program

Inner-City Action has a special Christmas program planned for Dec. 20 beneath the freeway at the corner of Lincoln and Washington streets.Ministry volunteers will set up a pair of tents and hos...

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Christmas program

Inner-City Action has a special Christmas program planned for Dec. 20 beneath the freeway at the corner of Lincoln and Washington streets.

Ministry volunteers will set up a pair of tents and host a holiday meal as well as a toy giveaway.

Toy donations and other contributions are welcome. Information: (209) 679-5880.

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STOCKTON - The Rev. Frank Saldana pokes at the red-hot coals with an everyday garden hoe.

He also directs a team of volunteers preparing barbecue turkeys for the 400 or so drug addicts, prostitutes and "street people" starting to gather for weekly outdoor worship services just beneath the Crosstown Freeway.

"I believe when people have a fair opportunity - and they're ready - we see them make it," says Saldana, who leads a unique ministry to Stockton's homeless population.

"Make it," for Saldana, means a redirected life, one that leads to purpose and personal success.

He is the head of Inner-City Action, a loose-knit congregation dedicated to "bringing life back to the people" as the lettering on its bus, a mobile clothing store, proclaims.

Every Thursday at noon, the 43-year-old Saldana and his team - a collection of rehabilitated criminals and ex-narcotics abusers - set up high-powered music equipment and hundreds of chairs. And they roll out large, cast-iron grills.

They feed all who worship with them - every week. And Saldana preaches.

This Thursday, it was a Thanksgiving celebration held just a few feet below the thundering freeway. Those who gathered sat on folding chairs.

Saldana, a former drug user and homeless person in Oakland, calls the iAction ministry "a church without walls." He became a Christian through the ministry of Manteca's Christian Worship Center and seven years ago started his mobile ministry in Stockton. After bouncing around from location to location, iAction, another name used by the group, settled on Lincoln and Washington streets.

They've been there a year, and they've been growing. For awhile, iAction was adding 50 new chairs a week.

"This is our church," says Juan Mendoza, 26. "I feel honored to help people and help them get back on their feet."

He recently got out of prison and was court-ordered from his native Fresno to Saldana's care. "I'd been on the streets since I was 13, using meth, and I'd been arrested on gun charges." Today, Mendoza is the associate pastor.

What drives Saldana?

"Let me illustrate: A woman gets out of prison, she has a record from drug charges, she can't get welfare and she's stuck on the street downtown. She's either someone who is abusing her body or she's a prostitute.

"I'm not OK with that."

For the volunteers, there was added meaning to Thursday's turkey feast, a special kind of week-early celebration of the national holiday.

"We feel like having Thanksgiving with them," says Mendoza, "because we've created a family atmosphere around here - and we want to celebrate the holidays with our family."